The Escalante Hotel

The Escalante was Ash Fork's grand hotel, a Fred Harvey house that opened in 1907 in Mission Revival style, all crystal chandeliers, gardens, and a curved lunch counter. In the Harvey system, railroad travelers ate and slept at trackside hotels like this one, waited on by the famous Harvey Girls, and the Escalante ranked among the finest in Arizona. Then the automobile emptied the trains, and the trains stopped needing their hotels. The Escalante was torn down in the 1970s, one more Harvey House gone to the wrecking ball.

What the plaque says

"The Famous Esclante Hotel". . The hotel opened March 1, 1907, and was built of steel and concrete in the Mission Style of Spanish architecture. The hotel covered a space of 420' X 200'. Cost was approximately $115,000., On the ground floor of the structure was the lunch room fitted with a circular counter, a large curio shop, newsstand/reading room, and a barber shop. There was also a beautiful crystal chandelier lighted dining room which was somewhat centered within the hotel. The east side of the hotel hosted beautiful gardens., Ash Fork was an important railroad junction at that time. Passengers and freight bound for central and southern Arizona boarded the trains at the famed Hotel Escalante. Alas, the beautiful hotel was demolished in the '70's.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Williams — 17 mi
  The last town on Route 66 to lose its traffic to the interstate — a rail gateway to the Grand Canyon since 1901, bypassed only in 1984 after a court fight, and revived twice over.
• Seligman — 22 mi
  The town that refused to die when the interstate went around it — a barber's crusade made this the Birthplace of Historic Route 66, and the reason the Mother Road still runs.

More markers nearby

• Ash Fork — steps away
• William Sherley Williams — 16 mi
• The "World Famous" Sultana — 17 mi
• Santa Fe Railway Freight Depot — 17 mi